Posts from the ‘Grilled’ Category

Learning how to make these delicious patties is one of the best things I’ve done. Not only have I learned a new cooking technique, but you can play around with different variations and combinations of ingredients to this recipe and the final product, if I do say so myself, is very delicious!

These patties are meant to be on the sweet side and just a little salty. That’s due to the curing powder you use. You can make the patties as big or as small as you like, put them on skewers and cook on the bbq or in the oven, or even pan fry them.

As a child I remember eating these straight off the skewer, or wrapping them in lettuce or rice paper with lots of herbs with a dipping sauce – such delicious memories. But I have recently started eating these just with rice or in sandwiches as a quick snack and my family have started to do the same. How ever you eat these, you wont be disappointed!

The main ingredient is pork mince but I also add thinly sliced pork strips too. This time round I experimented with prawns, however, you don’t have to add the extra prawns or pork strips to the pork mince, just make sure the total weight of meat is roughly 1.5 kg. The different texture of meat adds to the flavour of the patties and makes it more interesting.

This amount feeds a family of 5 with left overs for lunch the next day. Or in my case … a second dinner!

Make sure you use good quality minced pork for these patties. Place the mince pork in a large bowl and set aside.

Today I’m using prawns instead of the pork strips, to combine with the minced pork. I only had pre-cooked prawns today, but you can also use raw prawns, either way it’s fine. Roughly chop up the prawns and set aside.

Step 2: Prepare the rest of the ingredients.

Chop up herbs, mince the garlic and thinly slice the onion. Set aside.

The curing powder is found in most Asian supermarkets. It’s an essential ingredient to this recipe, so do your best to find this in your local Asian store if you can.

Step 3: Making the pattie mixture.

In a large bowl, combine all your ingredients together (starting with the minced pork, prawns, onions, garlic, sugar, chicken stock, salt, white pepper and curing powder).

A good tip to getting the patties nice and firm is to knead and mix this by hand for at least 15-20 minutes. This will allow your patties to keep its shape when you roll them out into patties. It’s recommended that you use gloves when mixing this by hand. You will know if you have mixed this enough if the mixture is sticky or if your arms start to ache – who needs to go the gym! But you have to mix for at least 15 minutes to get the right consistency.

TIP: You can also do this in a food processor which will cut your mixing time by half! Combine the all the ingredients except for the pork strips or prawns in a food processor. Pluse for 5 minutes or until the pork mince is all combined and starts to become sticky, then add your pork strips or prawns.

Cover the mixture with glad wrap (cling wrap) and put this in the fridge for at least 30 minutes or 2 hours if you have the time. You could even make this the night before.

Step 4: Time to roll.

I always have a bowl of water handy to keep my hands clean and it also helps to smooth out the patties so there are no lumps or bumps. With this mixture I made 18 patties.

Step 5: Cooking the nam neung:

As I mentioned earlier, you can cook it on the bbq, or on a frying pan on the stove top but I prefer to cook these in the oven.

Pre-heat your oven at 180 degrees on fan bake and cook the patties for about 20-25 minutes on each side. They will turn a pinkish colour with a golden coating on them but just keep an eye out so they don’t burn!

NOTE: Cooking times and temperatures varies depending on how big or small you make your patties. The result should be a nice pink colour, similar to som moo (cured Asian pork).

Step 6. Slice them up and serve with plain jasmine rice as we had for dinner last night or as I did this morning, with avocado on toast. Great start to the day. Eat them anyway you desire!

Give this a go, you’ll be surprised at how easy and delicious these are!